


Haunted

by Kannika



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Conner is so done, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, Humor, M/M, tim is oblivious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:02:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26935567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kannika/pseuds/Kannika
Summary: “Tim,” Conner said, laughing into his hands, and it wasn’t quite hysterical but he was definitely getting close. “Tim. Babe. Hon. Man I love. Literal genius who has outsmarted Batman multiple times. You bought us ahaunted house.I can’t take youanywhere.”
Relationships: Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent
Comments: 20
Kudos: 194





	Haunted

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Halloween!! I know it's early but I wrote this months ago and I can't stand to sit on it anymore lol. Halloween is a month-long celebration in my book so I'm calling it good. 
> 
> Anyone else remember that Twitter thread going around a while ago about 'I almost bought a haunted house because I thought it was charming and my husband is the only reason I definitely wasn't murdered'? I got definite Timkon vibes from that. These disaster kids, I love them.

Tim was in love.

Conner was… a little less so.

“Are you sure?” He muttered, looking at the house in front of him. “Tim. You have literally millions of dollars—"

“Billions.”

“Really?”

Tim shrugged. “If you’re going to knock me for how rich I am, you can at least get the insult right.”

Conner cast his eyes skyward. “Why am I dating a rich snob?”

“Because I buy charming houses for us to live in together!”

“Charming. That’s… not the word I was looking for, babe.”

It was _a_ word. Tim glanced back at the house, trying to pick out what it was that made Conner less excited about their first house together than he was. Maybe it was the fact that the paint was peeling. Or that some of the windows were cracked. It was a little bit of a fixer-upper, he could at least give it that, but the bones of it were sound, he was sure. And it was a nice old mansion, on a beautiful property, close enough to Wayne Manor that it would be no trouble at all to extend the tunnels they already had to connect the houses so they would be minutes away in the event of the inevitable emergency…

“You’re not going to budge, are you?” Conner sighed, coming over and resting his chin on Tim’s head to wrap his arms around him. “You have that look that makes Batman’s eye twitch. You’re buying this house.”

“ _We’re_ buying this house.” Tim reminded him, and squirmed around in his arms to face him. Conner looked about to kiss him but he wasn’t through talking so he held his face in place. “We’re living here together, remember? So… if you really don’t like it…”

“I like it,” Conner rushed to say, because he was perfect like that, but his eyes strayed over Tim’s shoulder. “I’m just… a little confused.”

“By Gotham’s standards, this is perfect, you know. The market for places that haven’t been crime scenes is very thin.” Especially since Conner insisted on paying for part of it, which really put a dent in their budget. It really wasn’t necessary, but Conner was stubborn and Tim thought it was kind of chivalrous.

Conner’s eyebrows jumped. “Then we should live in Metropolis—"

“Where your dad with super-hearing lives.”

Conner cringed. “Right. Good call.”

“Thank you.” Tim watched his face carefully. He really wanted this, there were only so many places that were isolated enough that they could be useful home bases and he didn’t want to wait a year to build something, but if Conner really didn’t like it…

Conner sighed. “Alright. I’m in.”

Tim brightened. “Yes!” He leaned up and planted a kiss on Conner’s lips, pleased with the slow smile that spread over his face. That was why he was doing this. He was going to get to see that beautiful smile every day, he was going to get to sleep with him without his dad or brothers intruding into his room at ungodly hours to sabotage him, they were going to get to be normal people in love for once… “So we can buy it?”

“Yes. We can buy it.” Conner frowned. “Why was it on the market so cheap, by the way, if it’s not a crime scene?”

“The previous owners died and their kids wanted to get it off their hands right away.” He pulled away and pulled out his phone. “Hold on. I’ll call the agent.”

Conner hummed, still frowning at the house. “Why would the kids not want to keep it?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t really make sense.”

\-------------------------

There were some interesting architectural decisions inside the house, too. 

Like some of the doors. Tim frowned at it. “This lock is weird. Did you see this, Conner?” 

“I did.” He frowned at it, too, messing with the hinges on it so it flipped back and forth. “It’s three parts to one lock. I’ve never seen that before. Is that a Gotham thing?” 

“Sure,” Tim said, surveying it. It was weird, but… there were a lot weirder things to Gotham than the locks on the doors. He could live with it. “Look, when you pick a beautiful old house that isn’t an active crime scene, you have to have slightly lower standards.” 

“And this is your city.” Conner wrinkled his nose. “Also, beautiful isn’t the word I’d think of. Did you see the weird scratches on the wall in the cupboard?” 

“Yeah. They looked like a raccoon. That’s just because it wasn’t taken care of for a while between when they put it on the market and when we bought it.” 

Conner looked doubtful. “Then it was an enormous raccoon.” 

“Maybe a mutant.”

“…You don’t sound sarcastic.” 

Tim wasn’t. Conner realized and groaned. “Oh my god. Why did I agree to live in Gotham? You have multiple protocols for clown emergencies!”

Tim laughed and nudged him toward the kitchen. They could debate design choices later— he needed coffee. “Clown protocols are common sense and you should have already known about that. What we need to talk about are balloon hijackings. Then you’ll know what you’re getting into.”

\-----------------------------

Tim walked into the room they had designated the library— there was already a bookcase, with a hidden door book that he was thrilled to find, he didn’t even have to install anything in this house to make it more like Wayne Manor _it came like that_ — and nearly ran into the door on the way out. 

That was weird. He hadn’t closed it. He pulled it open again, picking up the stack of books he had started to move in and shuffling toward the bookcase. He had picked a bunch of old-looking books from Wayne Manor on purpose to blend in with the switch to the secret room, and he needed to at least fill those shelves in before they had their housewarming party. A secret room wasn’t secret if you could tell exactly what it was. 

After a few moments, just long enough that he thought he got it, it slammed shut, hard enough that dust fell out of the ceiling. 

“Did you do that?” Conner called, sounding concerned. 

“No.” He looked around. There had to be a draft somewhere that they hadn’t found yet. “Another thing to fix.”

He’d get around to it.

\---------------------------

“Whoever painted this had really weird taste.” Tim sighed, putting his roller back in the paint. “Did you see this?”

“See what?” Conner frowned. “That is a weird color. Why would someone paint a wall brown?”

“No idea.” On a whim, Tim sniffed, jolting backwards when his suspicion was confirmed. “It smells like herbs.” 

“Let me smell.” Conner inhaled, and then coughed and pinched his nose shut. “Ow. That was mean.” 

“What do you mean, ‘ow’?” 

“It’s strong.” Conner’s nose wrinkled. “And I have enhanced senses. That was mean.” 

Tim grinned. “I’m so sorry.” He couldn’t help it— his hand inched down to the paint roller. “Here, I have a better smell, hold on—"

And he painted Conner’s face. 

Conner yelped, caught off guard for a fraction of a second— then his eyes narrowed. It didn’t look very threatening with a stripe of white on one half of his face like a bad football fanatic. “Okay then.”

Tim, like the brave man he was, took off running.

It was a short chase, running from someone with superspeed, but he did manage to get a few rooms over before Conner tackled him, putting a bright white handprint on his butt. And then Tim got him in a leglock and flipped him over, and there was paint everywhere, and while Conner was distracted trying to get it out of his hair he took off running again. 

There was _so much_ paint on the floor, but when Conner finally gave up on trying to get himself clean and caught up to him, dumping the black they had for another room down his back so that it looked like he had rolled in oil, Tim didn’t care. He was laughing so hard he was almost crying, and he couldn’t even remember the last time he had done that. 

This was why he was going to be with Conner, Tim thought all over again. This was what he wanted, forever— the stupid things that were so, so worth it. 

“That’ll teach you,” Conner said smugly, looping his arms around Tim’s waist and making a face when Tim put a black handprint on his cheek. “Jerk.” 

“Who decided to dump it all over the place?” Tim sighed, looking at the footprints on the carpet. It was a good thing they were planning on putting hardwood down, because he wasn’t sure it would all come out. How had they even managed to get that many footprints on the floor? He hadn’t seen Conner go into the bathroom. “You ruined our new floor!”

“Babe. You have a trust fund.”

It was the principle of the thing, really.

\---------------------------

Conner was in a bad mood. 

“Kon?” Tim asked carefully, trying to keep his voice nonjudgmental. “Is everything okay?” 

_“No,”_ he ground out, picking up one end of the sofa to look underneath it. Tim braced himself on the chair in case Conner decided to pick it up while he was still in it. Sometimes he forgot things like that when he was focused. “I can’t find my bracelet.” 

Tim frowned. “You don’t wear a bracelet.” 

“I don’t.” He sighed, dropping to the ground to look under the heater. “But Jon made everyone friendship bracelets and I just know if I don’t wear it to visit Clark and them tonight he’s going to be upset.” 

Tim bit his lip against a grin that he wasn’t sure would be appreciated. Not yet, anyways. “It’s sweet that you’re looking for it.” 

“Jon is the worst when he’s upset.” Conner groaned and strode into the kitchen. “He doesn’t actually say anything, he just gets quiet and you feel like you kicked a puppy. Where the hell did I put it?”

“The worst is Damian,” Tim called, but he set down his book and stood up to help. “He stabs people when he’s upset. Where did you last see it?” 

“Damian stabs people when he’s _happy,_ Tim. And I don’t remember! I know I packed it, because I knew I would have to wear it at least once to show Jon I had it, so it has to be somewhere!” He groaned again, aggravated. “Last week I couldn’t find my gloves, or my headphones, and now that bracelet. There’s a black hole somewhere, I swear.” 

“I lost my flash drive last week. It’s not a black hole, it’s that everything is messy because we’re still unpacking.” Tim tossed him his phone, which thankfully hadn’t gone missing. (Yet.) “Call Kara. See if she’ll loan you hers for tonight.” 

Conner brightened. “You’re a genius, Tim.” He dropped a kiss on his forehead. “I have to go. I’m going to be late. See you after dinner!” 

“See you—" He was already gone, and Tim sighed and shook his head. It was hilarious how often people with superspeed could be late, so he couldn’t blame him for running out the door. It was still sweet, how Jon had made him a friendship bracelet he was trying to keep track of. He’d do a little more unpacking tonight to try to find it for him. 

Things disappearing wasn’t unusual when you moved into a new place. It was just a little annoying. 

\---------------------------

A funny thing that Tim was learning about living with Conner: they had completely opposite sleep schedules. 

Conner was up for staying up late with him if he needed it, sure, but his energy levels dropped abruptly when the sun went down. He could still fly, still fight, but Kryptonians were powered by the sun and he didn’t want to do much when it disappeared. He liked to stay up and keep Tim company while he worked on his laptop, or he admitted sometimes that he would keep an ear out for him and wait for him to come back when he was on patrol, but that was mostly the extent of it.

And now, away from the manor and everyone there’s insomnia, Tim had a lot of time to himself late at night. It was kind of nice, to just sit with his laptop in the dark and work without interruptions. Right now, Conner’s arm was halfway around his waist, and Tim could recline against his stomach as he slept and just absorb the wonderful heat and security of his boyfriend. He had been up for about forty hours so far, but Conner didn’t know that so he couldn’t bug him, and he didn’t want to stop. There was something intensely satisfying about working until you dropped, sometimes. Besides, the work was important. It was worth a little sleep deprivation.

Although there was an odd sound coming from the other room. Part of him wanted to see what it was, but that would require waking up Conner and that was basically a sin. He settled in, stroking Conner’s hair and (barely) resisting the urge to kiss him.

But Tim had just focused back on the coding when he heard it again. It almost sounded like… voices?

_Get out… get out…_

Tim frowned, glancing down at Conner. Logically, if there was someone in the house, his boyfriend gifted with super-hearing would be awake. Logically, one of their many security measures would have caught it, and flipping through the cameras he had hooked up, he could see no breaches. Logically, if there was someone in the house, they wouldn’t bother to give themselves away by whispering stupid things. 

So logically, there couldn’t be anything there.

“I need to lay off the coffee,” Tim muttered. “Hearing voices is new.”

He put in headphones, turned it up to drown out the noise, and got back to work.

\---------------------------

“Tim,” Conner called. “Can you come here, please?”

His tone of voice was odd, sent Tim scrambling to his feet in a second and grabbing for his staff. If it was an emergency there would be noise, probably, there would be yelling and crashing— but Conner sounded wrong. Sounded… _scared,_ almost. 

Tim ran, skidded around the corner. “What? What’s going on?”

Conner was staring at a wall. “Is this a weird prank you’re pulling on me?” He asked. “Because it’s working, and also I’m moving out.” 

The wall, which they had painted white over the course of days of hard work, had been painted over in red, block letters that slightly dripped and made his skin crawl: _TRESPASSERS._

“Um. No. Not me.” Tim frowned. “Maybe it was Jason.” 

“Jason?” Conner demanded, taking a step back and putting his hand to his nose. “Would Jason use real blood for a prank? Because that’s real blood, Tim.” 

“This would be over the top for him,” Tim admitted, and because Conner was still turning a little pale and it made him nervous, he crossed the floor and wrapped his arms around him. “Hey. If it’s a prank, it’s a bad one, right?” Maybe it was Damian. He knew what the concept of a prank was, but he didn’t know when something was too far. 

“It’s in our house!” Conner snapped. “And how would they even get in? You have security cameras everywhere.” 

“They’re crazy. You signed up for this when you agreed to move in with me.” 

“Yeah, but really, this is just the latest thing with this house.” Conner sighed. “You picked an interesting one, hon.” 

“We’re just sleep-deprived because we’ve been working hard and moving into a new house.” Tim laughed. “Just the other day I thought I heard voices, I was so tired.” 

Conner’s eyebrows jumped. “You heard _voices?_ ” 

“Thought I did. I told you, I was exhausted.” 

Conner frowned over at the wall. “Did you find anything behind the secret bookcase door?” 

“Um… some more scratches. I really think there was a racoon trapped in here for a while.” 

“A really big raccoon,” Conner said, remembering, and then his jaw dropped. “Oh my god. That wasn’t a raccoon.”

He jerked away from Tim and went to the wall— not the one that was apparently covered in really good imitation blood, but the one that they had painted over a few weeks ago— and inhaled deeply, jerking back. “The herbs were sage.” He pivoted around to face Tim, eyes wide. “Tim. They use sage to drive away ghosts.” 

If this was a prank, it didn’t matter who had done it, Tim was going to _kill them_ for riling Conner up this much with it. He actually looked freaked out. “They also use it in baking. It’s nothing—"

“It was so cheap,” Conner said, putting his face in his hands. “And no one else wanted it, including the kids of the people who died.” He laughed. “Our house has a ghost. I _told you_ I got bad vibes from it—"

Tim sighed. “There’s no such thing as ghosts—" 

“It’s a ghost! It is—" He gestured in the direction of the bloody wall. “An _incredibly pissed off_ ghost! We’re living with a ghost! I freaking _told you_ I didn’t think that was a raccoon—"

“Conner,” Tim said, trying to keep his voice level. “It’s not a ghost. There’s another logical explanation.”

“Like what?” Conner asked, laughing into his hands, and he wasn’t quite hysterical but it was definitely getting close. “Tim. Babe. Hon. Man I love. Literal genius who has outsmarted Batman multiple times. You bought us a haunted house. I can’t take you _anywhere._ ”

“It’s not…” Tim started again, like a broken record, but then he stopped. Thought it over. The doors that opened and shut for no reason, the things that moved that weren’t him or Conner, the footprints, the voices, the creepy markings… Holy shit. It all added up. “Huh.”

“’Huh’? That’s all you’ve got for this?!” Conner groaned. “We live in a haunted house. I don’t believe this.”

In retrospect, Tim had to admit that his first clue should have been that it was in their price range in the first place.

\-----------------------------

Lois thought it was hilarious. She was doubled over she was laughing so hard, and there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. He had never seen someone find a blood-stained wall so funny. 

Tim sighed and glared at Conner. “Did you have to tell her?” 

“I needed to tell somebody. I needed someone sane around here.” Conner couldn’t stop looking around the house, like he was waiting for more creepy writing. It was kind of hilarious, considering he was bulletproof, how much the idea of a ghost freaked him out— although Tim had to admit, it being _in their house_ was a little much. “Clark…” 

“I hear you, bud,” Clark said, patting him on the shoulder in sympathy. “Although, I gotta ask… you’ve been here for weeks. How did it take this long to realize it?”

“Because Tim kept telling me I was crazy!” Conner said, pointing at him, because he sucked sometimes. “I told him, ‘why is it on the market in the first place’? I told him, ‘why do so many of the doors have three locks on them’? He just made it sound like all the houses in Gotham are like this! He tried to tell me the blood-writing was a _prank!_ ”

Lois snorted and turned out her pen like a microphone to Tim’s mouth. “Your response, child prodigy?”

Tim frowned. “There is no such thing as ghosts—"

“I fly!” Conner yelled, flinging his arms out. “I fly and you fight crime with a man dressed like a bat! And ghosts are where you draw the line!” 

“…It made sense at the time?”

“This comes with being friends with a bat,” Clark said, and it sounded slightly pitying, which Tim did _not_ appreciate. “They’re brilliant and impossible at the same time. You know this. You signed up for this.”

“Standing _right here._ ” 

Conner groaned and put his head in his hands. “Clark. I’m not just friends with him. I’m dating him. What if this is contagious?”

Clark patted his shoulder again. “Just don’t let him pick the honeymoon trip and you should be fine. Now you know.”

Tim eyed him. “You’re not as nice as Clark as you are as Superman.”

“I married Lois,” Clark reminded him. “Her moxie _is_ contagious.”

“You’re welcome.” Lois had her phone out. “Have you told your brothers that you bought a haunted house yet? I’m not usually a clickbait person, but I think this will be worth it if I can get their genuine reactions on camera.”

“No!” Tim jumped to point at Conner and Clark, who blinked back at him owlishly. “No, no, no, no. You can’t tell them. We just call Zatanna and this all goes away before any of them find out. _Promise me_ you won’t tell any member of my family about this.”

Conner rolled his eyes. 

None of them promised, and Tim groaned.

\----------------------

If Jason didn’t take a breath soon, he was going to pass out, and Tim was going to leave him there to be picked off by crows. 

Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ Bruce. He didn’t have to announce Tim’s mistake in front of everybody. The secret that he had definitely learned from Clark when he had specifically told him that he was only supposed to tell Zatanna. The secret that even if he had to confront Tim about it, he didn’t need to do it in front of the person most likely to give him endless grief for it.

He could pretend he was dead. That was a foolproof way to escape mockery and responsibility for a while in this family.

“You… you…” Jason wheezed. “You bought a fucking _haunted house_ for you and your boyfriend. I can’t fucking believe it.” 

“Okay,” Tim snapped. “Okay, look. Would you believe a house was haunted? Logically?” 

“Logically, no. But your house definitely looks like people were murdered in it.” 

“There was nothing online that said it had been a crime scene.”

“Normal people don’t admit to that!” Jason wiped a tear, an honest to god tear from his eye, and took a deep breath. “Oh my god. How did mini boy scout take the fact that you were living in a haunted house?” 

“He did _what?_ ” Dick yelled from the entrance to the cave. 

Tim groaned and put his head in his hands. “Why don’t you just call Vicky Vale, let her know too while you’re at it?”

“Your house is really haunted?” Dick asked, grinning. “How do you know? Did your lamp move from one side of the desk to the other? Because that might be M’gann playing a prank on you.” 

He had thought of that. None of them gave him credit for _anything._ Tim scowled. “I’m not stupid—"

“Are you afraid of the dark?” Jason asked. “Do you need a night light?”

“We woke up and someone had painted ‘trespassers’ in blood on our living room wall,” Tim deadpanned. 

Jason choked. “Holy shit. _That_ was what it took to get your attention?”

“You should apologize to that poor ghost,” Steph said from the corner. “It had to work so hard to get you freaked out. It was just trying to do its job and chase out the new people and you made it do the oldest thing in the world to get your attention.”

“Shut up!” Tim nearly dumped Steph out of the chair at the computer and sat down. “I have work.” 

“You do not. You’re going to play minesweeper. Stop changing the subject.” The back of the chair tilted so that Tim was looking up at Steph grinning at him over it. “This is the stupidest thing you’ve done for a while and we need to take full advantage of it.” 

“What stupid thing did Drake do?” Damian asked. He sounded almost _eager,_ and Tim groaned and let his head fall onto the desk. 

“Bruce,” he said, because if Damian was here then Bruce had to be with him and this was _his fault._ “You’re dead to me.”

“I thought you were trying to keep us involved in your life,” Bruce said. 

“I am telling none of you anything _ever again._ ” 

“Someone tell me what Drake did,” Damian demanded. 

“He bought a house with a ghost in it,” Jason said. 

A pause, and then Damian scoffed. 

“Ghosts are not real,” Damian said. “How would he have known to look for that?”

Great. Damian was the only person on his side. And he hadn’t thought the day could get any worse.

\-------------------

The good news about being a part of Batman’s family— even with all the drawbacks, like how terrible they were to have as siblings— was that he knew people that could take care of the weirdest problems ever. Thank God for Zatanna. She was serious and professional and only gave him one small bit of ribbing that was admittedly deserved, and then she took care of it. 

Which meant after a month, finally, Tim and Conner had the house that they thought they were buying in the first place. 

“So,” Tim said with a smile up at Conner when he came and hugged him from behind with a deeply-satisfied sigh. “We’re ghost free. No longer living in a haunted house. Are you happy?” 

Conner wrinkled his nose. “It smells like sage and smoke. I think I preferred the ghost.”

“You did not.” 

“I didn’t.” He turned to Tim and raised an eyebrow. “What did we learn from this?” 

“That adventure follows me even when Batman isn’t involved?” 

“It really does.” Conner kissed his forehead and went to open the window. “And that you wouldn’t survive without me.”

Tim thought about arguing, but… “Not really.” 

Conner smiled and shook his head. “So. Are you going to argue if I tell you that _I’m_ picking where we’re going on vacation next?” 

Tim frowned. “I… kind of had an idea, actually.” He hadn’t bought the tickets yet, granted, but it seemed nice and romantic. Hopefully Conner would just be okay with his choice. 

Conner looked wary. “Shoot.” 

“I was thinking Bermuda.” 

Conner raised an eyebrow. “Bermuda.” 

He didn’t sound convinced. “There aren’t any ghosts in Bermuda, babe. And it’ll be tropical, and—"

_“Bermuda Triangle.”_

Tim scoffed. “That’s a myth.” 

“Oh my god.” Conner groaned, but gathered him up in a hug, putting his head on Tim’s. It left him staring at the wall where the ghost had left them a threatening message, which probably accounted for at least part of his pessimism. “You’re lucky I love you, and when our plane crashes or we find a sea monster or something, I get to say I told you so.” 

Tim smiled. That sounded fair. “I’ll get the tickets. You’re on.”


End file.
